Page 131 of A Soldier's Return

Who on earth would be coming to call at—she checked her clock—eleven o’clock at night?

She went to the opposite windows but couldn’t see a car in the driveway. The caller knocked again and Sage moved warily down the stairs, one hand on Conan’s collar.

The best Conan would do was probably sniff an intruder to death but he was big and could look menacing if the light wasn’t great and the intruder had bad eyes.

She left the chain in the door and peered through, but her self-protective instincts flew out into the night when she saw Eben standing on the porch, a frantic expression in his eyes.

“Eben! What is it? What’s happened?”

He studied her for a moment, then raked a hand through his hair. “She’s not here, is she?”

She blinked, trying to make sense of his appearance on her doorstep so late. “Chloe? No. I haven’t seen her since the two of you left. She’s not at home?”

“I thought she was just sulking in her bedroom. I gave her maybe twenty minutes to get it out of her system while I made a few calls. But when I went into her room to talk to her, she was gone and her window was open. I was certain she must have come here to find you. That’s what she said, right? That she would run away and find you.”

Conan whined and ran past them sniffing around the perimeter of the wrought-iron fence.

“You checked the beach?” Sage asked.

“That’s the way I came. I ran the whole way, sure I would bump into her any minute, but I couldn’t see any sign of her. I called and called but she didn’t answer.”

His eyes looked haunted. “I have to find her. Anything could happen to her alone in the middle of the night!”

His desperation terrified her as nothing else could. “Let me throw on some clothes and get a jacket and shoes. Perhaps we can split up, cover more ground.”

Anna’s door suddenly opened and she poked her head out, her hair as messy as Sage had ever seen it and her dark eyes bleary with sleep. “What’s wrong?”

“Sorry we woke you.” Sage spoke quickly. “Chloe’s missing. She was angry with her father about what happened earlier and it looks as if she snuck out her window.”

She couldn’t help but be impressed at the rapid way Anna pushed aside the cobwebs and became her normal brisk, businesslike self. “What can I do? Do you want me to call the police?”

Eben drew in a sharp breath. “I don’t know. I just keep thinking she didn’t have enough time to go far. Where could she have gone? There aren’t that many places she’s familiar with around here.”

“I don’t know. We’ve explored the area around here quite a bit this week in camp.” Her voice trailed off and she gazed at Eben and saw the exact same realization hit him.

“Hug Point,” Sage said. The beach they had visited when they took the tandem bicycle.

“Would she have time to get there?”

“She’s fast. She could make it.”

“That’s a hell of a long way for an eight-year-old in the dark,” Eben said, and she ached at the fledgling hope in his eyes.

“She has a flashlight. It’s part of the survival kit we did the first day of camp.”

“That must have been what she was rummaging through her room to find. That’s something, isn’t it?”

“Maybe.” She paused, loathe to tell him more bad news but she knew she had no choice. “Eben, the tide is coming in fast. High tide will be in about ninety minutes.”

She saw stark fear in his eyes and knew it mirrored her own.

“We should split up,” he said. “One of us search down the beach in case she hasn’t made it that far yet and is still on her way and the other one start at Hug Point and head back this direction.”

“Good idea. I’ll drive to Hug Point and start backtracking this way. You take Conan with you.”

She thought of the way the dog had immediately gone to Chloe that first day, as if he’d been looking just for her. “If she’s out there, he’ll help us find her.”

“Okay.”

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